Church Of St Dubricius

Church of St Dubricius

Parish church. The building dates from around 1300, with significant work in the late 14th and 15th centuries, and was restored by J P Seddon in 1853. It is constructed from squared sandstone and sandstone rubble with sandstone dressings, and roofed in tile, stone slate and Welsh slate.

The church comprises a west tower, a four-bay nave with a north aisle and north porch, and a two-bay chancel with a north vestry.

The west tower is 14th century with three stages, the lowest and middle sections undivided externally. It has an embattled parapet and a deep moulded plinth. A square full-height projection at the east end of the north side contains the newel stair. Diagonal buttresses with offsets extend to the north-west, south-west and south-east up to a string course marking the base of the top stage. The ground stage contains a large west window with a two-centred head, three cinquefoil-headed lights and tracery. The second stage has one small central light with a two-centred head to the south and west. The top stage has a two-light bell-opening to each side with trefoiled and ogeed heads and quatrefoil tracery. The east side bears marks of an earlier nave roof. The west face of the newel projection has three loops. A sundial on the south wall is reported to have an inscription to Annah Smith dated 1680.

The north aisle has single-light trefoil-headed windows: one in the west wall and one on each side of the north porch, with the eastern window flanked by 19th-century weathered buttresses. The 19th-century vestry has a trefoiled window to the right of a square-headed north doorway with shouldered jambs; its east window is also trefoil-headed. The chancel has one trefoil-headed light to the east of the vestry and diagonal buttresses to the north-east and south-east. Its east window, much restored, has a two-centred head and three lights. The south wall of the chancel has two trefoil-headed two-light windows, one on each side of a weathered buttress.

The nave is buttressed by two 19th-century buttresses, the left one rising above a blocked south door to an octagonal chimney shaft. To the left of this buttress is a trefoil-headed window; to its right are a square-headed window with spandrels and two ogeed trefoil-headed lights, and a two-light window with chamfered and moulded jambs and a two-centred head. The north porch is 19th century with a gable cross and a chamfered outer arch with a two-centred head. The circa 1300 north doorway beneath is chamfered with a segmental head.

Interior

The interior features an almost continuous scissor-braced roof, perhaps 15th century in the nave and chancel; the chancel roof has collars and mid-19th-century painted decoration. A four-bay arcade of double-chamfered two-centred arches separates the nave from the north aisle. The piers are octagonal with outer chamfered orders that run out in pyramidal stops above the octagonal abaci.

The chancel has a mid-19th-century painted wall scheme with foliated designs around the windows and an ashlar lining in terracotta colour. To the left of the east window is a genealogical tree extending from Adam to Abraham. The east window contains stained glass, possibly 15th century, with one nimbed figure to each side light and a smaller figure, likely the donor, in the central light. A 19th-century credence on the north wall has a part-octagonal pilaster with a quatrefoil frieze. A 19th-century quatrefoil drain of a piscina is positioned in the easternmost window of the south side. An 18th-century chair south of the altar has scrolled arms, a fielded back-panel extending to the floor, chamfered rails and arms supported on balusters. An early 17th-century chair on the north side has a back-panel with an arch and Ionic capitals, moustacheoed caryatids, and a front rail with arabesque decoration. Its scrolled arms are supported by turned balusters extending downwards as front legs; the back panel contains a stylised vine with grapes and another arabesque design along its bottom margin.

Three brass hanging oil lamps, probably circa 1900, hang in the chancel. A late 19th-century organ with polychrome pipes, a hand pump and an inscription reading "THE GIFT OF THE REVD T P SYMONDS OF PENGETHLY" is integrated into the east wall. Flanking doors lead to the organ chamber and vestry. The vestry has a 19th-century fireplace with a moulded two-centred arch and mantel supported on two corbels. Its west window, formerly an external window of the north aisle, is trefoil-headed with late 19th-century stained glass depicting "The Mother of Jesus / S John II i".

The nave contains a chancel screen which is substantially 19th century, possibly incorporating late medieval tracery on its cresting. It has four open cinquefoil-headed tracery panels and a central two-centred entrance with a mid-19th-century inscription reading "O WORSHIP THE LORD IN THE BEAUTY OF HOLINESS". On the north side, an opening to the former rood-loft has a square head. Nineteenth-century ogeed open-panelled desk and matching bench are in the same style as contemporary choir stalls.

A 17th-century pulpit comprises seven parts of an octagon with guilloche ornament, fluted pilasters and an arch to each face (three panels deep). The bottom panels are square, and the plinth has two zones of small arched friezes. A Caroline chair with turned balusters to the back and stretchers and vine-leaf decoration to the open-work back-panel has a woven cane seat.

On the south wall hangs a copy of Ecce Homo by Carlo Dolci inscribed "Corsini, Firenze". A wall memorial commemorates the 15 fallen of World War I from the parish. The blocked south door has a two-centred head and contains two end panels from a late 17th-century or 18th-century chest tomb with cartouches, scrolled margins and putto heads. In front of the door stands a cast-iron stove, probably late 19th century, inscribed in raised lettering: "THE NATIONAL SLOGAN / No 5".

The north aisle contains remains of stairs to the rood-loft and a square niche to the left of the east window. To its right is a sexfoiled 19th-century piscina drain. Beneath the window is an altar carved by Ethel Strachan in 1903 for the Revd Scarlett Smith. A 19th-century chandelier for six candles is arranged on a circular band with paterae.

The font is probably late 15th century, with a square base rising to an octagon, an octagonal stem with trefoil-headed panels, and an octagonal bowl with a curved underside. The bowl is decorated with panels containing two recessed female heads and rosettes. Six brass oil lamps of the same design as those in the chancel hang in the north aisle.

The tower arch has two orders with two-centred heads; the inner is more pointed and dies into the jambs of the outer. Beneath is an oak screen with open upper panels similar in design to those of the chancel screen, presented as a memorial for Sydney Lidderdale Smith (1817–1903), Canon Residentiary of Hereford Cathedral. Within the tower is an 1829 Benefactions board, which includes an entry: "J Powell of Pengethley by his will dated 1605; gave out of the White-house Farm in the parish of Sellack aforesaid Twenty Shillings per annum payable on All-Saints day and to be equally distributed at Christmas and Easter for ever". On the north wall is a wall notice, possibly late 19th or early 20th century, by the Ecclesiastical Insurance Office Limited, entitled "Frequent Causes of Destruction of Churches by Fire", listing furnace pipes, oil lamps, workmen (especially plumbers), dust and matches, organ stores, organ repairers, organ music and desk lights, and the absence of lightning conductors.

A late 17th-century chest with rectangular panels and lock-plate was noted by the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales and Monmouth in their survey but was absent at the time of re-survey in October 1985.